Page 71 of Beached Wedding

He started walking toward the resort and I watched until he disappeared. When I finished my coffee, I walked in to make another. Something on the floor by the door caught my eye. An envelope. The sound of it being pushed under the door must have been the noise that woke me.

I set aside the empty cup and picked up the envelope addressed to ‘the soon-to-be Mr. and Mrs. Holloway.’

“Oh no,” I groaned, sitting down to open it, already knowing what it was.

Yep. Two sealed envelopes fell out. One was a pastel green with my handwritten, ‘Shane’ on its front, care of Waiola and this resort. The other was a business envelope with the T&B logo on it. My name was written in block letters above the address.

Open it? Burn it?

With shaking fingers, I opened the one I’d written.

Dear Shane,

I’m packing up the last of my things to ship tomorrow. I still can’t believe I’m doing this, but I’m really excited to start my new life with you.

I didn’t imagine that first night that we would come this far. I only wanted to have a small adventure when I left for Australia. Meeting you was the luckiest thing that has ever happened to me. I’m never lucky!

Thank you for being you. You’re always a gentleman and you make me laugh all the time, which is what I love most about you. That and your friends. Someone famous said “A man is known by the company he keeps.” (I looked it up, lots of people claim to have said it, but it remains true.) You surround yourself with the best people?—

I pressedthe page to her chest, wincing at how revealing this was.

—which tellsme how lucky I am to be marrying you. I feel like I’ve finally found the place I’m supposed to be. See you at the altar...

Ugh.

Was that really all I’d seen in him? His friends? Because if I was honest, there was only one friend who had consistently included me and made me feel welcome. One friend I had wished to see every single day. One who made me laugh and feel smart and important and, lately, confused and sexy and filled with yearning and despair.

I dropped the letter to the cushion beside me and rose to make a fresh cup of coffee, then hunted out what remained of the box of truffles, needing fortification before I read Shane’s letter to me.

I was kind of shocked he’d gone through with it. When Waiola had suggested it, I had thought it sounded like a lovely keepsake from our special day, but Shane wasn’t romantic. I had had to bug Fox to talk him into it and send it on time. I would bet anything that Fox’s DNA was on the back of the stamp.

Which said a lot about why I was reading these alone on my non-wedding day.

I let another truffle melt in my mouth as I sat and carefully tore the seal. The letter was on a standard A4 page, but folded weird to fit into the envelope. A yellow sticky note on the outside held Fox’s handwriting.

I didn’t read what he wrote, but I hope he knows how lucky he is. I love you both and hope you crazy kids knock this out of the park. Can’t wait to see you again. Love, Fox

I unfolded Shane’s letter.It was typewritten.

Ash,

I’m not sure what to say. Fox said to tell you how awesome you are and that I can’t wait to see you again. You are and I’m sure Hawaii will be great. If I’m beside you when you read this,you can tell me how wrong I was about not wanting to do our wedding there, haha.

I don’t know how to write mushy stuff, but we make a good team. I know that you make me better and my folks adore you. I’m sure the wedding will be great and we’ll be really happy.

See you soon,

Shane

I swallowedthe lump of chocolate, but it went down like a rock. I reminded myself to breathe as I absorbed the contrast in the two notes. Fox had used the word ‘love’ twice while Shane hadn’t used it at all.

Which was true to character for both of them. Shane wasn’t good a mushy stuff unless he was loaded. Then he wanted to hug everyone and tell you what a great mate you were and how much he appreciated you.

Fox wasn’t mushy, either, but he wasn’t afraid to say something like ‘I love you both’ if he meant it.

My biggest takeaway was that Fox had been rooting for us to succeed, but he’d also seen that we wouldn’t. Maybe he had protected himself with the prenup stuff and talking Shane out of coming, but he had actually protected all three of us from a painful, messy, inevitable breakup.

Because Shane didn’t love me. I didn’t love him. Not the way people should love each other if they were marrying and planning to spend their lives together. Not the way I ought to if I was leaving my family and home for him.

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